The Smurfs and Paramount Pictures have teamed up with the UN’s ActNow campaign and UNICEF on a global digital social impact campaign, which launched on 27 June 2025. The campaign encourages people, especially children, to Speak Up to empower themselves and others and to create a blueprint for a better world.
The campaign features a talent-driven Public Service Announcement (PSA) videos, starring the beloved Smurfs characters and the celebrated actors who voice them, including Rihanna, Hannah Waddingham, Billie Lourd & Amy Sedaris. The actors issue a Call-to-Action in the PSA driving viewers to a special ‘Speak Up’ section of the website of ActNow, the UN’s campaign to inspire people to act for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To date, more than 26 million individual actions have been recorded in ActNow.
Campaign assets also include four colorful Social Media Cards that are reaching tens of millions of followers globally. These cards feature the Smurfs highlighting the key campaign messages & the call-to-action driving viewers to the ActNow website, which features bespoke content with helpful tools for children and parents and links to relevant UNICEF websites.
MESSAGING
The campaign highlights the right of everyone - every child - to be treated fairly, and that everyone has a right to speak up and be heard. Children are encouraged to find their voice and parents & loved ones are encouraged to empower their children and to help them to speak up for a better world for all. Individuals are reminded that they’re not alone and that they can lean on others to find strength to participate in decisions that affect their lives. Our voices matter. We are loudest when we speak together.
GLOBAL DISTRIBUTION & PROMOTION
The campaign runs for eight weeks and is distributed & promoted globally through the flagship digital platforms of the UN, UNICEF & Paramount Pictures, including social media platforms & websites.
The UN’s campaign is also supported through a mobile app run by AWorld, which empowers people to become part of a community of changemakers by taking meaningful individual action and logging their impact, completing missions, earning rewards and more!
The campaign assets are also distributed globally through major broadcast networks & streaming platforms in the U.S. and internationally. To mobilize audiences around the world, Paramount Pictures’ parent company, Paramount Global, has unleashed its vast portfolio of flagship media properties.
The PSA has also taken over giant screens in one of the world's most iconic and recognizable crossroads, Times Square in New York City.